


Official and International

by sevenimpossiblethings



Series: The First Minute Is for Hello Kisses [3]
Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-04
Updated: 2016-08-04
Packaged: 2018-07-29 05:17:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7671580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevenimpossiblethings/pseuds/sevenimpossiblethings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>"The baby section,” Yusuf repeats slowly.</i>
  <br/>
  <i>"Yeah,” says Ariadne. She examines the tiny Hulk t-shirt in front of her. “Do you want to have a baby?”</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Official and International

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kenopsia (indie)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/indie/gifts).



> There's a tiny A/Y teaser in In Progress and I'm all about the follow through. If you need a refresher:  
>  __  
>  _Arthur leaned back in his chair. “He’s good in bed. We’re good in bed together. So? Don’t think I don’t know that you and Yusuf have a colleagues-with-benefits thing going on.”_  
>  ***  
>  _“Do I have a biological clock?” Ariadne asked._  
>  _Arthur did not fall out of his chair, but a lesser point man would have tumbled face-first into the carpet. “What?”_  
>  _“I’m just thinking, like, do I? Am I going to wake up one day and realize I want babies?”_
> 
>  
> 
> This fic is for kenopsia/katiewont, because she's wonderful and shares my feelings regarding Ariadne.

The job is stateside, this time, and Ariadne has taken it upon herself to introduce Yusuf to the wonders of Super Target. 

“Do you think they have cards for two-month anniversaries?” Ariadne muses.

They’re standing in the produce section; Yusuf is fondling an avocado while Ariadne selects a half-dozen organic oranges. Apparently this is the sort of thing they do now. 

“Two-month anniversary of what?” Yusuf asks. He slips the selected avocado into a bag and deposits the bag in the cart. 

“Arthur and Eames,” says Ariadne. 

“Don’t you mean two _years_? And by two, I mean four?” 

“No,” says Ariadne. “They’re all official and domestic now.” 

Yusuf waits until Ariadne has placed the bag with the oranges next to the rest of the fruit, then steers the cart toward the bread aisle. 

“I don’t think Hallmark makes two-month anniversary cards,” says Yusuf. 

“I’m going to check,” Ariadne decides. 

“You could send them a text. An email,” Yusuf suggests. 

“This is momentous,” Ariadne says. “Card-worthy.”

“Two months?” 

“After four years…” 

“You just want to leave me to navigate the cereal aisle on my own,” says Yusuf. 

“You know what I like,” says Ariadne, and skips away. 

The card section is on the other side of the store, practically in another ZIP code. 

There are not, in fact, cards for two-month anniversaries, and there is an annoying lack of anniversary cards not meant to be from one of the participants in the celebrating relationship. 

“What’s a girl got to do to be supportive?” Ariadne grumbles. 

She lingers over the general “Congratulations” cards, eventually settling on one that isn’t _technically_ “congratulations on getting married,” but, based on the design, probably could be. 

Ariadne has a bet with herself on how long it will take for Arthur and Eames to get married. She isn’t really sure of how bets with oneself are supposed to work, and she almost wishes Arthur weren’t one of the relationship participants—she’s sure he could come up with thorough spreadsheets taking into account all of the variable outcomes in order to determine what counts as a true win: if they’ll get married under their real names; if they’ll marry in the U.S.; if they’ll marry in the U.K. under fake names but in the U.S. under their real names; and so on. 

Card in hand, Ariadne means to go back to the grocery side of the store, she does. It’s not her fault that the baby clothes section is conveniently located on the way to the cereal aisle, where Ariadne assumes Yusuf still is. It’s not her fault that she gets distracted, either: it’s the onesies’. 

There are _so many_ of them. Onesies with dinosaurs and cartoon trucks. Onesies with hearts and racoons and apples. And the _hats_. 

It’s the matching hats that get her, with their firefighter badges and cute black bows and adorable monster ears. 

_God bless fall_ , Ariadne thinks. _God bless the Midwest_. 

She flits between the ridiculously gendered racks, letting her hands trail along the fluffy pastel-colored skirts and tweak the buttons of a tiny brown vest. The “gender-neutral” clothing options are all grey, white, or pale yellow, which, with the possible exception of the grey, are ridiculous colors for creatures prone to spit-ups. 

Ariadne doesn’t have any illusions about babies: they fuck with your body, they’re loud and messy and constantly needy, they sink into your heart so even when you’re not with them–even when you’re in lab or a meeting or out for drinks, and they’re with someone you trust—there’s a small part of your brain devoted to wondering if they’re okay. 

Even so. 

Her cell phone rings; it’s Yusuf. 

“Hey,” she says. 

“Did you get lost in the card section?” he asks. His voice is warm, endeared, and it takes very little of Ariadne’s extensive imagination to hear that voice reading a bedtime story, singing a lullaby. 

“Not exactly,” she says. Two women, one of whom is clearly pregnant, are eyeing the sweaters she’s standing in front of, and she moves to the side to let them approach. 

“Okay, well, stay wherever you are and I’ll come find you. If we both try to find each other, we’ll end up wandering endlessly. Where are you?” 

“The baby section,” she says, then clarifies, “The clothing area. Not the furniture area, with the cribs and whatnot.” Though they would need a rocking chair, definitely. 

“The baby section,” Yusuf repeats slowly. 

“Yeah,” says Ariadne. She examines the tiny Hulk t-shirt in front of her. “Do you want to have a baby?” 

The women who have been rifling through the sweaters look up at her sharply, eyes wide: _did you just ask your partner if they wanted to have a baby with you over the phone?_

_He has a good lullaby voice_ , Ariadne almost tells them. _He’s strong and soft and he’d let the baby tug on his curls and he_ cooks _and he’s brilliant and he’s not jaded enough to hide when he’s excited about things and he doesn’t run that dream den anymore._

“Do you want a baby?” Yusuf asks. Ariadne can hear the rattle of the cart through the phone; he’s on his way. 

“I think the whole biological clock thing might not be total nonsense,” says Ariadne. “Or, it is. But not for me.” The sweater-seeking women glance at each other, smiling, but the smile isn’t for Ariadne, she knows: it’s for the two of them, and whatever happy, fumbled conversations led them to where they are now. 

“You want a baby,” says Yusuf. 

“Yeah,” says Ariadne. She knows it will change things—change them, their work, everything. She still wants one. 

“Okay,” says Yusuf. 

“What?” It’s a good thing there aren’t any actual babies around to be startled by her exclamation. 

The two other women glance in her direction a final time before heading into a different section of the store, a small, eggplant-colored sweater draped over a roll of paper towels in their cart. 

“Arthur and Eames as godparents?” Yusuf suggests.

“Back up,” says Ariadne. “Back up. We can—you’ll—you want…” 

Yusuf appears, pushing the cart toward her in the narrow space between two racks mostly full of soft little t-shirts featuring falling leaves and pumpkins and candy corn. She swears she’s not hallucinating, but it’s just so _easy_ to imagine a small body tucked against Yusuf’s in one of those baby carriers, to imagine an ever-so-slightly older, steadier creature babbling away in the cart’s baby seat, plump little legs squirming in the openings, Yusuf making funny faces as he pushed the cart through the store. ( _Where am I_? Ariadne thinks. _Picking out the organic oranges and baby purée, maybe_.)

Ariadne hangs up. 

“Hey,” she says. The cart is still between them, and she glances into it: her preferred cereal brand is tucked between the produce and the bread. 

“So, official and domestic, huh?” Yusuf says. 

Ariadne looks down at the congratulatory card she’s still holding. 

“Yeah,” says Ariadne. “Although we don’t have to do it _domestically_ —I kind of miss my place in Paris, to be honest.” 

“I know you do,” says Yusuf. “You keep going on Google Street View to check up on the neighborhood when I’m reviewing my data. Not very subtle.”

“Quartier,” Ariadne corrects, sticking her tongue out. “Why didn’t you say anything?” 

“I wasn’t sure that you’d want me to come with. Paris is—yours. I didn’t want to push you into making me part of that, if you didn’t want to,” says Yusuf. 

Ariadne drops the card into the cart and steps closer to Yusuf, probably closer than what is really appropriate for a Super Target. 

“Come to Paris with me. Have a baby with me,” she says. 

“I’m in love with you,” Yusuf says, cautiously. 

“I wouldn’t offer Paris if you weren’t. If I wasn’t, too,” says Ariadne. 

“Sometimes it takes a while. The trying.” Yusuf’s hands find their way to her arms, loosely holding her in place. 

“I don’t mind.” Ariadne stands on tip-toe, whispering in his ear, “You’re not going to bore me.” 

“All right,” says Yusuf. He grins, the corners of his eyes crinkling, but the look in his eyes is more wonder than playfulness. “Paris, a baby.” 

Ariadne glances at their half-full cart. “Any objections to leaving now and making do without dairy products for another day?” 

“What do you have in mind?” Yusuf asks. 

“Something not fit for public consumption,” Ariadne says, briskly now, stepping back before she can do something foolish like back him up against an unsteady rack of baby jackets. She has to make these sorts of responsible choices, now that she’s going to be a parent—someday, that is, in the not-immediate-but-still-hopefully-somewhat-soonish future.

_It’s all under control_ , Ariadne tells her biological clock. _I’ve got you._

Yusuf is laughing at her, but he’s also already turning the cart in the direction of the checkout lanes. 

_I’ve got Yusuf._

_We’ve got this._


End file.
